


Rain

by IWasHereMomentsAgo



Category: Havemercy Series - Jaida Jones & Danielle Bennett
Genre: M/M, it's been raining for weeks here and i had a lot of feelings and this happened, so much cheese
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2014-08-19
Updated: 2014-08-19
Packaged: 2018-02-13 21:13:53
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 746
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/2165430
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/IWasHereMomentsAgo/pseuds/IWasHereMomentsAgo
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Hal's thoughts on rain and Royston.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Rain

The rain always reminded me of Royston.

Tucked away in the ‘Versity library, with candles flickering and books laid out around me while I worked, the storm raging outside left a strange mixture of both comfort and unease in my chest. The sound of the rain against the tall windows was almost musical, and before the rain had even properly begun petrichor would creep in, lovely and faint, through a window left open somewhere. But I knew I would soon have to venture out into the downpour, tuck my books beneath my coat to keep them safe and run down Whitstone Road to Royston and the umbrella he would doubtless have in his office (he was awfully fond of that umbrella and kept it at the Basquiat whether it was raining or not. I supposed it was because more people would see it there than at home - it was likely worth more than my entire childhood). I often stayed a little later than I ought on the rainier days, hoping it would let up just long enough for me to get back into Charlotte, if not all the way home, though I don’t know why I continued to bother. Thremedon seemed to wait until all of her inhabitants were out and about in her winding streets, far enough away from their homes to get thoroughly soaked before she began her most violent storms.   
Sometimes, when translations proved too difficult and I had decided to take them home for Royston to have a look at, or when I had finished work early, or simply when it took my fancy, I would watch the droplets dance across the panes of glass and remember another downpour I had been caught in. Thinking of that always made me more eager to take that trek down Whitstone Road.

The rain in Molly was much like her inhabitants - cunning and mercurial. I never had much of a reason to visit Thremedon’s outermost district, but on the rare occasion I did - or had gotten lost - I would always get caught in the kind of gentle rain which left you dripping wet with no idea exactly when it happened. It made the place smell terrible, fish from the docks mixed up with mud, and the grey skies and the grey buildings and the sour expressions made it a miserable place to be. I liked to imagine the skies were trying to wash clean the dirty streets, the clouds thinking they were doing everyone a favour when really they weren’t helping in the slightest. It made me somewhat more sympathetic to the rain, but not by much.  
I would always try to make my trip brief and quick, and hurry home before the wind started. It got awfully windy in Molly, more so than Thremedon’s upper districts. The wind there was cold and it was vicious and it left your ears and face burning and your umbrella inside out and the rain would lose it’s temper and hurtle into your eyes and your shoes. I had only been caught in it once. It was during one of my first weeks in the city, and I couldn’t at all seem to find my way back to Charlotte, back home. Royston had found me eventually - he told me Dmitri had ran into him and had mentioned seeing me - I never got around to thanking the Provost for that - and he had sheltered me in his coat like he had once before, and he took me home. He lit the fire, and once I was warm again, we laughed.

During my first winter in Thremedon, I discovered gentle breathing next to me coupled with thunder outside was one of my favourite sounds. Warm in bed, with my arms around Royston to ensure he didn’t get cold, I felt safe. I didn’t need to imagine Thremedon planning her attacks, or clouds trying to clean away dirt. I didn’t need to imagine anything. We had made it through storms, through downpours and magical plagues, through blizzards and that time we didn’t speak for two whole days for a ridiculous reason both of us had forgotten after the first few hours. The rain reminded me of Royston, but so did the snow, so did the sunshine. I was always thinking of him in some way, always loving him. He was in every beautiful thing, but he was in every horrible thing too, lighting it up. 

I had always loved the rain.

 


End file.
